Dave Blanchard, a reporter for National Public Radio, interviewed renowned travel writer Barry Lopez about his latest book, Horizon, which “All Things Considered” host Ailsa Change described as “a nod to heading over the edge of the familiar into the unknown.” Lopez sees travel as a moral act. What we encounter there, he says, can change us.
Horizon focuses on six places that have shaped his understanding of the world. Probably not surprising to those who try to practice active contemplation, Lopez says one of those places is his own backyard. Here is a snippet of the NPR story:
BLANCHARD: The conversation he’s talking about is a way of paying attention. Traveling or at home, Lopez finds lessons in the everyday. Walking outside his house, he grabs a branch from a small tree.
LOPEZ: This is vine maple. And you can see it’s just starting to bud.
BLANCHARD: This little sign of spring tells a bigger story to Lopez.
LOPEZ: Yeah, it’s the insistence of life. This is full of I-won’t-quit energy.
BLANCHARD: Lopez then takes his focus even wider still, tying this persistent little bud to people who feel the world is coming undone and who’ve lost hope.
LOPEZ: They’re ready to give up. But you — it’s — how embarrassing to give up when everything around you is growing.
The full radio story is here: Writer Barry Lopez Reflects On A Life Traveling Beyond The ‘Horizon’
I was listening to that radio story while on my hands and knees dropping seeds into dirt, my first sowing of the season. Spring planting is always a joyous time for me, filled as it is with so much potential and hope. How can one not be an optimist in the springtime?
I think the elation I feel this year is even more acute because the winter this year was so harsh and so recent. Just two weeks ago, we still had snow on the ground. I am really ready for this spring.
I planted a two rows each of spinach and beets and three kinds of radishes, knowing that because of “the insistence of life” these seeds would bear fruit and feed my family. I have confidence this will happen, and that is a great feeling, but as I look now at the photo I snapped of my gardening, I also realize how fragile a thing hope can be. The photo does not show that “insistence of life” — at least not yet. All I can see now is a plot of dirt.
As I continued on with my chores, I couldn’t help but reflect about the act of placing seeds into the earth, covering them over and patting them in place. In everyday conversation, we talk about hope as a longing or desire or wishful thinking (Today is the opening day of baseball season. I hope the Kansas City Royals have a good season this year!) But planting seeds is hope in action. Hope is something to be done.
Until beet, spinach and radish sprouts poke through that patch of dirt, I have to focus on the doing, the action of hope.
Dennis Coday 